Large Hadron Collider to run at half power

Will we get half-ageddon in November?

The Large Hadron Collider – or to give it its hip-hop name, the LHC – is set to return this November but with its power severely reduced.

This is not to say that the LHC will not have enough strength to end the world – it will.

But instead of being able to smash protons at a bone-melting 14 trillion electron volts, it will merely be able to bounce them together at just 7 trillion electron volts.

Another dimension

While 7 trillion electron volts is only half as exciting as 14, when we put this into context, the LHC is still the particle probing daddy. According to New Scientist no other collider has boldly gone this far, so we could be in for a few interesting revelations.

This is something that Greg Landsberg of Brown University agrees with: "Nature is full of surprises and something exciting and possibly unexpected could happen at 7 TeV," he explained to the New Scientist. "Extra dimensions could easily open up at that energy."

One step at a time, Mr Landsberg. Let's just get the thing up and running first.